Life Truths

There are Truths with a capital T. Tenets. Articles of Faith. These things that you believe so strongly, things no one had to teach you. Whether you talk about them or not, it doesn’t matter, these Truths live inside you, and they aren’t going anywhere. Over time, Truths don’t diminish in meaning or strength. They simply ARE.

You know Truth when you see it. There is no second guessing. Truth cuts through age in a way that even a child is able to recognize. At nine-years old, I remember seeing a Truth as clearly as I see my cuppa tea sitting beside me now. And the Truth WAS/IS/AND ALWAYS WILL BE this:

All people are created equally. We are all the same.

Crap Aside

Argue if you want. Claim we have different personalities, different mannerisms, different likes and dislikes, and I’ll tell you True, True, and True. But at our core, when we put all the crap aside, we are all the same.

What crap? The crap that says you have nicer clothes than she does, you have a nicer car, your job is more prestigious, you have a prettier house, your country is the best, your religion is the ‘right’ one.

The Truth about differences is this:at the core, if you see yourself as different from your neighbor, your brother, your friend — you see fear.

This may sound like a ‘soapbox‘ post. Come on — you know me better than that by now. This is a Truth. And one you may say, “Yeah, yeah. I know this Truth already. I know that we’re all created equal.” But if every you out there knew this Truth, our nightly news would only consist of the weather and freakish accidents, a derailed train maybe or a plane crash. The truly bizarre, out of the ordinary happenings. Full-time news slots would be available to broadcast the good, generous acts that people do every day.

No Pollyanna Here

I’m not being Pollyanna. Or even pie-in-the-sky. It is simply a Truth. We are the same. We are created equal. Your demons may look different than the next guy’s, but they are still demons, all bred from fear. Your joys may look different than your neighbor’s, but they’re still joys, filled with love.

Boil it down. Remove the mask. See the Truth. We are the same.

As 2013 approaches, instead of New Year’s Resolutions that are forgotten by January 5th, resolve to practice this Truth with your actions. See the Oneness in the eyes of every person you meet. Be motivated by Love, confident in knowing you are the same as he. Then sit back, give it some time. Watch. Your web will grow. Soon, those around you will follow suit, starting with your children. What a beautiful gift to give to your children. To yourself. Dare I say, to humanity?

“Difference”
~by Pie Corbett

As long as we see others
as different,
there will be hurt,
there will be pain,
there will be wars,
there will be more cold rain

falling

between us.

The day we learn
to shed our fear
like a snake casting its skin…

The day we learn
to see that we are all

molded

from the same warm clay.

That will be the day,
when the sun
breaks through.

That will be the day,
when we first see our true
selves.

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Who can relate to learning how to ride a bike as a kid, and the inevitable crash that followed? Maybe it wasn’t the first day, but at some point, you became comfortable, and stopped paying attention to what you were doing, or you attempted a new trick, only to come crashing down.

Maybe you never had this experience with a bike. For you, maybe it was on a skateboard, or rollerblades, or surf boarding in the ocean.

I’ve experienced many crashes in my life, but I’ve never surfed (nor is it on my list of top 10 things to do). However, when I watch surfers, I can’t help but notice what grace and skill they demonstrate. Effortlessly, they appear to mount their boards. They negotiate waves of all sizes with more ease than I can manage to prepare a simple dinner. And have you ever watched them wipe out? There’s no flailing about. No out of control appearance of their extremities. Just one fluid movement as they hit the water. How is it they look so graceful while crashing so hard?

These are the sorts of things I wonder about.

Here’s what I decided: there must be an art to crashing.

I imagine instinctively, their arms poised, ready to protect their heads. (There will be no flailing all over the place.) I also guess that along with not getting knocked out, a main area of focus is how to quickly get to the surface for oxygen.

After that, what is there? (If you’re a surfer, I apologize — I’m positive I’m WAY oversimplifying this.)

First, let’s assume the surfer wasn’t injured. We’ll agree that with the fall, what the surfer was attempting to do didn’t turn out the way he/she had planned; they may even call it a failure. So, what have they gained?

Knowledge.

Knowledge on how to:

stay up longer

maintain focus

better maneuver the waves

fall with grace, not for the sake of grace itself, but for the sake of survival

And all of this encompasses The Art of Crashing.

Without the crash, where does the knowledge come from? Reading a “Surfing For Dummies” book? Watching YouTube videos of surf boarding? While not bad ideas, the art of crashing provides the firsthand knowledge that leads to the goal of how to stay up longer, how to maintain focus, how to better maneuver the waves….

How many times in life do we fall? Fail? How many times do we crash? And after that fall, failure, crash, how often do we decide it’s just not worth it? I won’t love again because I don’t want to get my heart broken. (Crash.)I won’t attempt to let anyone see the real me because I don’t want to be betrayed again. (Crash.)I cannot trust because….(Crash.)

The broken heart, the betrayal, the inability to trust, those are the crash. Be the surfer who crashes with grace. Not for the sake of grace itself, but for the sake of survival. Your survival. And after your survival is realized, and you know you’ve reached the top of the water, and that yes, indeed, you’re inhaling the air which is now filling your lungs, continue to push forward. Ask yourself what knowledge was gleaned by living through this experience? What lessons were learned?

There is a definite art to the crash. It thrusts us forward and helps us heal as we take what we’ve learned to mend the broken heart. To allow others to see the real us. To Trust.

I encourage you to look for the surfer within. Examine your crashes and be open to the lessons they reveal.

For all those seeking HOW to Trust, and specifically to GL, who shared much of her heart in an email that prompted this writing, think of Trusting Life as a spiritual law. We must step back and allow it to work — that’s part of the art of it. When we worry, over-think a situation, hold grudges, and so on, we interrupt the flow. It’s through listening, becoming aware, letting go, and accepting What Is that we’re able to Trust Life.

Trust begins inside of you and radiates outward.

Feel, Know, BELIEVE that you are taken care of. You are never alone. There is a bigger force, a bigger plan that you are unaware of. Trust.

You all are incredible. Such smart, insightful, thoughtful comments you made regarding the “Holy Moly!” article. Between Facebook, this blog, and emails, I heard from more of you on this topic than any other…which means I wasn’t alone in thinking this topic is major. (If you’re just now joining us, please click here to refer to the post.)

It’s major because for one, we’re talking about our children here, and we all get a little nutty about our children. But it’s also major because it’s not just one thing, it’s LOTS and LOTS of things. It’s not just drugs we’re talking about; to many of these teens, they don’t even see the pills they’re snorting/taking as drugs, some actually thought they were some sort of vitamins, just used to help them hyper focus on school work. But, like I said, it’s just not about drugs, there are many more layers than that.

But peel away the layers.

Drug layer, gone.

Please my parents layer, gone.

Achieve amazing results in academics, sports, etc. layer, gone.

Peel all of it away.

Keep peeling, and what are you left with?

Children who believe that they are not enough.

Who grow into adults who believe they are not enough.

I don’t mean to sound so doom and gloom, but think about it, when you strip it down, that’s what you’re left with.

But it’s a lie. These children are enough. Each and every one of us is enough. But how do you make it Real, and not just sound like something nice to hear, say, in a blog that’s based on Trusting Life? How do you have kids stop to listen long enough to believe and understand and feel and know their worth…so that it stays with them into adulthood?

If Maya Angelou told you herself, in her deep, rich, authoritative, yet loving voice, then would you believe it?

I talk to my friends (and anyone who appears to be interested) a lot about Letting Go and Trusting Life. What it means to them. What it doesn’t mean. The difference between Trusting and Surrendering. And many similar Trust-like topics.

Back to back, here are two girlfriends’ takes on Trusting.

Girlfriend number one:

“I Trust Because, Well… I Just Do”

As we sat down with our breakfast, coffee, and tea, my friend starts by telling me she hasn’t given Trust a lot of thought, she just trusts. She says that over the years, she has been described as flippant, not very deep, and to some, not much of a ‘thinker‘. But to that she says, “Why over analyze everything? It’s exhausting!”

I think, ‘Yes, why do people do that?!’ Then quickly remind myself that I am the former Queen of the Land of Over-Thinkers. Okay, perhaps I’m Queen Emeritus. Back to my friend….

She continued,

The way I operate my life is to go with the flow. I trust that everything is going to be okay. But that doesn’t mean that I’m not going to take action. I still have to work and be thoughtful about my actions. I still have to handle my business.

For me, I know and trust that everything is going to be okay. What’s the alternative? Worry? Fret? Stir up a bunch of stuff? Not sleep? That just doesn’t make sense to me.

And what if it turns out badly? So what? You deal with that as it arises and keep going. At the end of the day, I can only do what I can do, and at that point, it’s time to simply let go.”

~~~~

Now, girlfriend number two lives in a different city, so unfortunately, I couldn’t sit and enjoy her company while chatting about Trust. I was happy however, to receive her honest email, which I thoroughly enjoyed while solo sipping my cuppa. I’ve entitled her portion:

“The Thought of Letting Go Brings Tears to My Eyes”

She writes,

“I’ve been given an interesting task. A friend of mine has asked me to tell her a story of a time I “Trusted Life.” I’ve been stumped. The more I’ve thought about it, the more I’ve realized that maybe I don’t Trust Life very much. And maybe this is what I was meant to learn from my dear friend.

I’m a planner. I mean a serious, I plan everything kind of girl. I’ve always been this way. Even as a child, I was always taking a toy car, pulling out a map, and planning a route to get somewhere. I find it very difficult to do anything without having everything planned out ahead of time.

Recently, I have been frustrated because things aren’t happening the way I planned. I know it’s a common problem, but I have not been handling it well. I’ve been ruminating over this issue again today and it dawned on me that maybe I just need to Trust Life and realize that things are happening the way they are supposed to happen for whatever reason. I just need to let go, control what I can, and trust that things will happen in their own way and time.

Trust me, even though this makes sense to me, I find it completely foreign and frightening as well. The mere thought of just letting go is enough to bring tears to my eyes. But hey, I’m on a journey and I guess for once, it won’t hurt for me not to know all of the details of what will happen along the way.”

~~~~

The Scorpion and The Frog

As I look at both girlfriends’ ideas on Trust, I’m not comparing for a ‘right way’ or a ‘wrong way’. What I’m struck with is how differently we approach Trusting from our core. And I’m reminded of the fable of the scorpion and the frog.

The story goes that the scorpion asks the frog to take him across the river. The frog is hesitant to do so, fearing the scorpion will sting him. The scorpion reassures the frog that he will not sting him — if he did, the frog would sink, and he himself would drown. After hearing this, the frog agrees, only to be stung by the scorpion mid-river! When he asks the scorpion why he did it, the scorpion replied, “I’m a scorpion; it’s in my nature.”

I’ve often wondered about stories like the scorpion and the frog — is it really in our nature to be a certain way? In our core? When I say, “I’m just wired to be like…” whatever it is, is that really the truth? For me, and for some aspects of my personality, I say, “Absolutely.” But for other aspects of my personality, I’d argue that it may have been easier or more convenient at the time to ‘be a certain way’, or ‘do a certain thing’.

And because I believe that as humans, we are complex beings, with intricacies we don’t even fully understand, I ask you, when it comes to the topic of Trusting, consider Trusting Life TODAY. Plan all you’d like. Get out your map and figure out your route. Do whatever it is that you do, that makes you uniquely and beautifully you….

…And after you’ve done all…stand. Stand and Trust that you are taken care of. And if you don’t do so hot one day, no big deal. Just Trust Life Today. And the next Today. And the next Today.

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I understand that for many, Trust does not come easy. It falls into the black-hole called "Easier-Said-Than-Done." And here is why: Because as children, most of us learned the exact opposite of how trust works.
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